


Let's Put All These Words Away

by TJ_73



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff, M/M, Mostly Canon Compliant, Post-Canon, Snowed In, There was more angst than I planned for, also tea and books, and a fresh start or two, two new years parties
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:13:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22042351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TJ_73/pseuds/TJ_73
Summary: Thomas Hamilton and James McGraw moved north since they left Savannah, settled down on a farm, and plan to celebrate the new year with their new neighbours.But a snowstorm, a ghost, and a book get in their way.
Relationships: Captain Flint | James McGraw/John Silver, Captain Flint | James McGraw/Thomas Hamilton
Comments: 2
Kudos: 60
Collections: Black Sails Gift Exchange 2019





	Let's Put All These Words Away

**Author's Note:**

> Written for ellelan on tumblr for the Black Sails Gift Exchange 2019.
> 
> Their prompt was:  
> Silverflint, Flinthamilton, or Silverflinthamilton, and snowed in is a fave for the season.
> 
> I hit two out of the three, hope you like it! :)

"Thomas, you look perfectly handsome, stop fussing." James smiled and batted Thomas' hand away gently so he could straighten the man's cravat and finalize the matter after watching him tie it over again for the past fifteen minutes. "There. Perfect."

Thomas flushed pink and turned to survey his appearance in the full-length mirror in the corner. "I can't remember the last time I've been to a party," he said, his hand instinctively finding itself on James' shoulder for support - whether for moral or physical support he couldn't be sure. He stared for a moment at the hazy reflection staring back at them, the edges of the mirror darkened with age as the silver coating had been worn away around the frame. It felt like a dream, seeing the two of them standing there. Like a memory half forgotten.

"It will all come back to you." James' hand on his arm made him start. He looked back in the mirror and thought for a moment that they looked like a painting, standing there in their finest clothes. They were a fair shade more modest than the garments he had grown up in, but considerably more wealthy than anything he had worn in years. Himself in deep blue and James in black and burgundy. 

Miranda once had a dress in the same shade of red. 

Thomas turned to James and the silence between them hung like a blade for a brief second. "This will be a new year," James said at last. "A fresh start."

"Indeed." Thomas turned away from the mirror and sipped absently from the teacup he had left to go cold on the table. "We'd best be off, Mrs. McCarthy is expecting us. When I spoke to her at lunch the other day she gave the impression that she thought you a perfect match for her daughter." He laughed in the way he always had, and James felt his heart leap into his throat. 

"She is two years widowed, apparently. Two children in need of a father, Mrs. McCarthy says," Thomas continued, taking his coat from the rack and shrugging into it a little less gracefully than he preferred. Years of being dressed by servants had left its mark upon him, however subtle.

"And have you told Mrs. McCarthy that I am hardly an eligible bachelor?" James' face was hard, but there was a coy smile in his eyes. The same one he wore when indulging Thomas' whims back when he was still referred to as 'my lord'. Thomas recognized it by the way he set his teeth and the faint crinkling of the skin around his eyes. 

"Of course, but short of telling her I married you myself there was no dissuading her." That was enough to break James' icy expression and he leaned in for a kiss as Thomas fumbled with the buttons on his coat. What began as a playful peck on the lips lasted longer than he intended, and Thomas' hand rested on the back of his neck as his eyelids slipped shut. 

James' chest still grew tight when he thought of everything they had been through - together and apart - that led to every moment they spent together. Of the suspicion and fear in London, of mourning a death without a body, and every body since then that Captain Flint put in the ground to be able to stand in his kitchen with the love of his life. He thought of every step he had taken to leave the sea behind, of the smell of lilac in the spring that grew outside their kitchen window, and how it felt to wake every morning with Thomas Hamilton's face on the pillow next to his own. 

A new year. A fresh start.

"We're going to be terribly late," Thomas whispered, resting his forehead against James', eyes still half closed and a smile on his lips. 

"Mrs. McCarthy can wait," James said, picking up the kiss exactly where they had left off. 

_

"Thomas! Fashionably late as ever," Mrs. McCarthy greeted him as he entered the room with a warm smile and an only slightly reprimanding tone. Thomas flushed a familiar shade of pink as he brushed the snow from his hat and coat before handing them to the maid. 

"My deepest apologies, Mrs. McCarthy. This weather was far more than we bargained for, to be sure. Caught us rather by surprise as we came into town," Thomas said, ever the diplomat. "But forgive me my manners, this is James, who you have heard so much about." He gestured to his partner who had also just rid himself of his snow laden coat. 

"Mrs. McCarthy, it's an honor to meet you at last. Thomas speaks so highly of you." James took her hand in greeting as was polite, and crafted his most charming smile. She was a handsome woman, lingering traces of her youth still evident in her eyes and the precision of the application of her lipstick. James didn't trust her in the slightest. 

"The pleasure is mine," Mrs. McCarthy said. "Thomas speaks quite fondly of you. After both of your wives passed so suddenly I hope it isn't too soon for you to attend tonight. My family has been hosting these little New Years Eve soirees for years. You may find it a chance for a fresh start in the new year. But please, excuse me." She gave a knowing look and flitted off to greet her latest guests in the doorway who were still knocking the snow from their boots.

James glanced back at Thomas who was flushed and visibly attempting to hold back laughter behind a tight-lipped smile. 

"My _wife_?"

Thomas let out a low burst of laughter, failing to hide it behind his hand as his other squeezed James' shoulder reassuringly. "It was the best story I could come up with, short of referring to you as my stable hand." 

"In which case you would have been walking home, my lord," James replied, a broad smile breaking across his face as they entered the parlour. Thomas gave him a light jab to the ribs as if to say _'be nice'_ as they greeted the other guests. 

It was a distant departure from the society functions they had once attended in London, and it was hardly one of Thomas' forgotten salons, but the McCarthy manor was warm and comfortable. The walls and floors were hewn wood as was the New World way, accented with local furs and heirloom carpets from warmer shores. At some point during the night, in between polite laughter and casual conversation with the other farmers and butchers and masons and their wives, Thomas tapped James on the shoulder. 

"James, I cannot seem to find our gifts with the others," Thomas said, gesturing with the half-empty glass in his hand toward the buffet table in the parlour where all of the guests had brought gifts for their generous hosts. James looked closely at the table, scanning it with a honed gaze for the telltale red ribbon that marked their butcher paper wrapped gifts.

"They were by the door when we left, did you not take them?" James asked, his tone more curious than accusatory. 

"I thought you -"

They shared a distressed look, both sets of eyes flicking from the table back to each other. 

"I'll go back for them. We can't attend a party empty-handed," James said, his propriety winning out for the first time since he could remember. 

"Mrs. McCarthy will understand, I can bring them back next week when we take tea..." Thomas' protestations were weak, as he knew James was right, but wasn't prepared to give up his companion for the evening. "Besides, the storm seems to be worsening," he remarked with a tone of finality, as if it would settle the debate. They both looked to the nearest window and saw their own reflections in the lantern light as a flurry of white swirled behind the pane. 

"I shall be back within the hour," James said, donning his hat and coat in the hall, which were still damp from his arrival.

"Are you sure you'll be alright?" Mrs. McCarthy asked. "You live so far from town, you're liable to be lost in the storm. You are both more than welcome to weather the night here in our guest rooms."

"Nonsense, neither hell nor high water could keep me from delivering your gifts Mrs. McCarthy. Especially after the work Thomas put into them." James gave her a soft look, the ice behind his eyes melting for just a moment before he opened the door and stepped out into the night. 

_

The trek home took longer than he anticipated. The snow was coming down in heavy flakes and blown sideways by the wind that picked up over the fields. Halfway home James had to dismount and walk his horse the rest of the way. The lantern they had left hanging outside the door had blown out, but a faint glimmer through the dark made him wonder if they had forgotten to extinguish a light inside. The snow was up to his knees by the time he made it to the little cottage by the trees. 

He took the horse to the barn and tossed an old blanket over her back to keep warm until he returned. He himself was in need of a warm cup of tea before braving the weather once again. 

As he opened the door of his house, the lit lantern on the table struck him as out of place. Hadn't he put it out before they left? In fact, he was sure he had left it on the counter. James closed the door with a cold grinding of the metal latch against its resting place and took a few silent steps into the kitchen and wrapped his frozen fingers around the handle of the largest knife he owned. With the other hand he lit a match and set the kettle to boil for his cup of tea. 

The flame in the oil lamp was turned down low, casting a faint orange light about the cottage. Deep shadows in the corners hid any number of nightmares, the kind that kept him awake at night with familiar faces and blank eyes. Demons whose names he dared not speak out loud. What emerged from the shadows, however, was somehow more frightening than the ghosts that haunted his dreams. 

Silver. 

James' arm flew up instinctively, the tip of the blade in his hand pointing at the other man's head. 

"Do you have any idea how difficult it was to find this place?"

"That was the point." James' teeth clenched as he spoke. "Get out."

"Don't you at least want to know why I'm here?"

"No, I don't." 

Silver took a half step further into the light, casting his features into sharp relief. James' memory flashed back to the dark moments when New Providence Island had burned and those moments Silver lived up to the name everyone had whispered in fear. The name Flint himself had borne for longer than he could fathom. The name on every tongue in the civilized world when they spoke of the pirates Flint had once called brothers. 

Monster.

Silver reached into his coat and James took the last step between them, the edge of the knife pressed a hair's breadth from Silver's throat.

"Don't make me do this. Not now."

Something flashed in Silver's eyes. It took James longer than he would have cared to admit to realize it was hurt. Despite the very real threat upon his life, Silver withdrew a wrapped package from a pocket inside his coat and set it down on the table, his eyes never once leaving James'. 

"Go on, open it," Silver said, raising his hands in a show of innocence. 

It took little effort for James to peel back the layer of linen with one hand, the other still holding the knife outstretched in Silver's direction. It was a book. The leather binding looked familiar, and he turned it in his hand to read the spine. 

"Where did you find this?" James' voice was low, his eyes hidden in shadow as he stared down at the book. The hand holding the knife wavered only slightly. 

"I don't think it matters much now, does it?" Silver shrugged. "It's yours, isn't it?"

James set it back down and flipped open the front cover, not daring to hope for what he saw inside. His arm dropped, the knife now dangling loosely in his hand. 

"I read it on the way here. I wasn't planning on it, but this journey took a few weeks longer than I expected. I didn't think you'd move this far north," Silver said as he sat slowly in one of the chairs at the table.

James fell into the one opposite, his eyes not leaving the book. "What did you think? Of the book, I mean."

"It was...useful, I suppose." He seemed to be fighting for words. 

"Thank you for this," James said, finally looking up. "But you need to leave." 

"I don't know if you've looked outside recently, but I doubt either of us is going anywhere." James looked up and followed Silver's gaze to the kitchen window. Snow had piled up on the sill and he could barely see the barn outside for the blowing snow. 

He cursed and went to the door, noting that the pristinely wrapped gifts were still on the side table where he'd left them. He unbolted the door and the wind caught it before he did, blowing the door open and forcing a hail of snowflakes into the room. Where the snowdrifts outside had been up to his knees on the way here, it now surpassed his waist. He stared out into the dark for a moment, searching for the distant lights of town in the gale but saw nothing. James forced the door closed once again. 

"You're not considering going back out there, are you?" 

James turned and looked at the old quartermaster sitting at his table. Something in his voice, the way he phrased the question, it reminded James of a time when Silver had still been on the outside of his scheming. When every decision he made struck the cook as insanity. A time when Silver had brazenly declared that in a few weeks time they might just be friends.

James shook his head, dispelling the ghost of that young man from his thoughts. The man who was as dead now as Captain Flint. 

"No," he said, turning the stove down low as steam spouted from the kettle. "It would be suicide to go back out there now."

"When has that ever stopped you?" The question slipped out before Silver could stop it. He coughed. "I don't suppose there's enough water for a second cup of tea?"

James didn't turn, his back still to the man at his table, but he pulled down two cups from the cupboard. It was silent for a long time between them as James prepared the tea and came back to the table to sit. There was no sugar - it was too expensive this far north. Miranda would have been disappointed in him. Likely for more than just the lack of sugar.

"Do you remember that New Years Eve party in Nassau?" Silver asked, staring down into his tea. 

James set his cup down. 

"The one in Guthrie's tavern?"

Silver nodded, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "That was the night that -"

"The night Gates stood on the bar and proclaimed himself Emperor of Nassau." James smiled despite himself. 

"Do you remember where he got the crown?" Silver laughed. 

"I think it was Logan, but I distinctly remember him whacking me on the head with a broom handle and knighting me," James said, grinning now into his tea. 

"You got off light then compared to Billy," Silver said, holding up his tea cup as though mimicking a toast. "'Billy my boy, you're like the son I never had -" James joined in as well, raising his cup and imitating Gates' drunken slurring. 

"I doth declare you my rightful heir and beneficiary of my estate - the whole fuckin' city of Nassau!" They recited together, cups held above their heads. 

"And then he fell off the bar," James laughed. 

"And passed out under the table - we had to yell over his snoring."

"He had the worst bruise on his head the next day and couldn't remember a damn thing," James said, sighing a little as he caught his breath and set down the cup in its saucer. 

Their laughter died down, and the room was silent again save for the gentle simmering of water in the teapot. The air between them grew heavy. 

"I regret that most, you know," James said, his voice suddenly sober. "Of all the things I did, his death is the one that keeps me awake at night."

"Neither of us would be here if you hadn't," Silver said. "He would have killed us all. The Ranger, the Walrus, every last man would have died that day if he ran."

"If he trusted me I wouldn't have had to do it. I've gone over that year in my head so many times, but I can't find another way." 

Silver set down his cup, the light sound of porcelain clinking together filled the room before dying away. "But it was worth it, wasn't it? All the pain you caused. You wouldn't be here with him."

James paused, staring down into his empty cup. 

"The day I came aboard the Walrus - if you knew then that Thomas Hamilton was alive, would you have left Nassau? With the Urca schedule in hand and all of that gold practically within your grasp?"

"Without question." There was anger in James' eyes now. 

"I think you would have done it anyway. One last prize. You had already come too far to let it go, to let Thomas' dream - your dream - of a self-sufficient Nassau sail back to Spain with all that gold." Silver locked eyes with James as he spoke, the way he did when he knew he was right. "I think everything would have happened the way it did, and you and I would be sitting at this table just the same. Maybe a little sooner. Maybe your conscience would be a little lighter. But the outcome would have been the same."

"Do you want to tell me why you're really here?"

That gave Silver pause. The pirate sat back in his chair and shook his head. "I had to know if I was right."

"Just what the fuck is that supposed to mean?"

Silver picked the book off the table and paged through it for a time, silence between them. Finally he seemed to find the section he wanted and cleared his throat. "Be like a rocky promontory against which the restless surf continually pounds; it stands fast while the churning sea is lulled to sleep at its feet. I hear you say, ‘How unlucky that this should happen to me!' Not at all! Say instead, 'How lucky that I am not broken by what has happened and am not afraid of what is about to happen.'"

He looked back up to find James' expression listless and pale. He looked like he'd just seen a ghost. 

"Marcus Aurelius was full of shit," Silver continued, finally, slamming the book back down on the table. "We can't stand against the sea forever. Sure, we can weather a few storms, absorb the blow. But for how long? It broke you and it broke me too, and I'm fucking terrified by what's about to happen."

James saw the shift in Silver's expression, how he slipped so seamlessly from self-righteous oration into a worried frenzy. He lowered his voice and chose his next words very carefully. "It did, you're right. It broke me. But I picked up the pieces. Is that why you're here, then? To debate philosophy? What do you think is going to happen?"

"Because you were never the promontory, you were the _sea_!" Silver shouted. "Flint was the sea. He consumed and destroyed everything in his path. He killed men for nothing. Good men. And I was the rock - the only thing that could even hope to stop it. I killed him for it, because there would be no peace while he still lived. Flint died back there on that island, but part of me died with him. I've only ever been John Silver - the thief, the cook, the quartermaster, the monster - I can't separate who I am from who I was then. But back then it was enough. I was enough. I loved Flint, and you can't tell me that he didn't love me back."

James was silent. Everything he wanted to say evaporated on his tongue. Every retort and insult short of slandering the man's mother ran through his mind, and by the time he opened his mouth the only words he found were: "You're right."

Silver stared at him in disbelief. 

"You're right," he said again. "Flint, he - _I_ loved you. As much as I knew how to at the time." 

Silver stared down absently at the table, the faintest of smiles on his face. He slowly got to his feet and picked up his coat from the rack by the door, shrugging into it and doing up the buttons. 

"Where are you going?" There was fear in James' eyes now. 

"That was the reason I came," Silver said, adjusting his crutch beneath his arm. "I had to know it was finished, that I really did kill Captain Flint."

"How can you be certain?"

"When you found Thomas again, did he still feel the same? Even after hard labour and indentured servitude, after scandal and betrayal and everything he endured, was he still the same person you loved?" 

James nodded, thinking back to the expression on Thomas Hamilton's face when they found each other in that field in Savannah and the feeling in his chest as though they had only just seen each other the day before. 

"That's how I know. There is nothing left of Captain Flint in you."

"Then stay. You won't get far in this weather tonight." James turned the stove back up to boil more water for another pot of tea. 

Silver hesitated at the door, staring out the window as the snow settled silently outside. The lights from town were still obscured by blowing snow, and James' own footprints had long since disappeared. The old pirate sighed and began undoing his coat. 

"You know what else I remember from that party?" James said as he poured water into the pot. 

"What's that?"

"When we kissed in the storeroom and I threatened to kill you in a dozen different gruesome ways if you told anyone."

"It was fourteen ways, actually. But I was far more sober than you were." Silver smiled. "I was thinking of how, halfway through the night, Logan came downstairs wearing Charlotte's bloomers and sat in De Groot's lap."

James laughed with his whole body, the skin around his eyes crinkling as they squinted shut. "Didn't he try to call a vote to have Logan keelhauled?"

"He did, indeed," Silver said, sitting back down in his chair at the table. "If I remember correctly, the 'ayes' had it, but-"

"But Eleanor Guthrie shouted from the balcony that there was to be no keelhauling in her bar," James laughed, picking up where Silver left off. 

"Unless you're cleaning up the mess, in which case I'd love to see you try!" Silver imitated her voice as best he could, as they both devolved into laughter. 

James and Silver talked late into the night, until the lantern burned low and snow outside grew higher. When he awoke the next morning, still sitting at his kitchen table, James realized he was alone. Silver's coat was missing from the rack, and any tracks he may have made while leaving had long since disappeared from wind and snow. 

For a moment, in the stillness of the morning just before the dawn, James wondered if it had all been a dream. Nothing more than a ghost in the storm. But there was the second tea cup on the table, next to the copy of Meditations. Just to be sure, he pulled back the cover again and found Thomas' inscription staring back at him. Satisfied, he began putting his jacket on to clear a path to the barn and begin the slow trek back to town. Thomas must have stayed the night at Mrs. McCarthy's manor. 

He looked back at the kitchen before opening the door and something struck him about the book. He picked it back up and leafed through, the pages falling open naturally to where a folded piece of paper had been pressed between the pages. He opened it, finding the handwriting familiar, but one he had not seen in some time. 

It was a transcription of the Urca de Lima's lost schedule. 

_

By the time James made it back to town it was already late afternoon and the sun had begun to sink into the western sky. He hopped down from his horse and dug two now slightly disheveled looking gifts from the saddlebag before knocking on Mrs. McCarthy's door. "I'm sorry they're late, but I hope you can forgive me," he said to the woman when she came to the door. "Frightful weather last night."

He and Thomas made their way back home shortly after pleasantries and tea ("I really must insist," Mr. McCarthy had said), the travel faster now that a path had been formed but still relatively slow. The stars had come out by the time they made it back. 

"Thomas," James said, as they dismounted at the door.

"What is it?"

"Happy New Year," he said, and kissed him again like it was the first time all over again.


End file.
